As an engineer, what can you do to speed up PCB production and reduce costs for your company? The first and most obvious answer is to simplify your PCB designs. However, if you are wrestling with significant design challenges, oftentimes youre going to have to make compromises here. Should you cut components, avoid using vias, or deviate from manufacturer recommended board thicknesses?
One way to figure out how to optimize PCB production is to experiment with numerous prototype models on a computer. CAD technology is extremely advanced, and a good program should be able to calculate metrics for your finished circuit. Of course, before you go into full scale PCB production, you want to create a prototype.
Speeding up PCB Production
Your CAD software should be able to give you a comprehensive inventory of the properties of your PCB. Yet you can never completely anticipate how the PCB will react to the environmental conditions of the real world. Thats one of the reasons why fabrication experts recommend building complete prototypes–including all interconnected PCBs in a system–before filling an order.
The Devil is in the details, at least in terms of how to optimize alloy levels and board thickness. If you try to make the board dense by adding dozens of layers, you could introduce a number of extremely tough technical challenges. On the other hand, if you strip the thickness of your PCBs too much, you might make them too large to be useful in the context of your overall system. Thus, most design engineers eventually compromise.
Drawing up PCB schematics for hundred layer multi-level boards can involve an incredible amount of computing. Even the most powerful computer aided design programs on the market may not be able to handle the incredible challenge of maximizing the layout for all the constraints. Indeed, often, electrical engineers must use best guess methods to determine workable schematics.
Thus, what usually ends up happening is that PCBs are designed not for optimal use but for functional use. That said, some electrical engineers on the cutting edge of technology now believe that there is a better mousetrap. Instead of building schematics to fit constraints, they simply enter a number of initial conditions and attempt to grow circuit boards on their computers.
Growing PCB Schematics
This modeling method is radically different from methods used in the past. However, experimenters have already generated some really interesting results. Indeed, as computers get faster and faster, proponents of this PCB growth method suggest that they will be able to handle more intricate circuits and eventually lessen the burden on both engineers and manufacturers.
Of course, even if you do use this growth method to develop your schematics, you still need to put some human quality control into the design stage. After all, if you have no constraints whatsoever, your design generator program might easily come up with models which optimize for odd variables. You could even generate ideas which are impossible to build in the laboratory.
What does the future hold for PCB technology? While electrical engineers the globe over are experimenting with new material sciences techniques and new advanced methods of mass fabrication, the real action is at the design level. Big manufacturers are constantly developing techniques to engineer circuits on the micro and nano levels. These techniques are becoming more and more mainstream.
Of course, the most advanced and cost effective engineering methods are still proprietary. Thus, whats happening is that many engineering firms are developing similar methodologies simultaneously and not sharing information. Eventually, at least according to some industry watchers, many of these techniques will become common knowledge. Once we get passed this so-called tipping point, many exotic and diverse kinds of PCB fabrications will emerge.
Thinking about the Future of PCB Tech
What will the new PCB technology look like? On the one hand, we will likely find similar design layouts and electronic schematics. On the other hand, manufacturing methods will likely change significantly, at least cosmetically. For instance, nowadays, manufacturers build PCBs by exposing photo-resistant film over copper plates and then etching the unexposed copper away to create wires in the board.
In the future, manufacturers may indeed be able to grow boards using automated processes. Indeed, some biotechnical experts are already experimenting with using DNA as a circuit making material. Although the results of these experiments are somewhat inconclusive, it seems inevitable, at least according to many futurists, that experiments in biology will have real and usable implications for electrical engineering.
PCB computer wizards can give you exciting and relevant design tips while youre drawing up your schematics. Of course, since most commonly available PCB wizards are relatively simple programs, you have to check to see that the design ideas that the wizards develop meet your application specs. That said, plenty of engineers are already taking advantage of advanced CAD software to the speed up the line.
PCB development blends science, art, and business. In order to keep costs at a minimum, manufacturers often request that engineers avoid using exotic materials and unusual components in their designs. On the other hand, developing a unique PCB sometimes requires breaking the rules. Dont be afraid to spend a little more in order to get a design that really meshes with your application.
Employing PCB Wizards
With your computer aided design system at the ready, you can tackle a host of engineering problems virtually. Instead of appealing to the manufacturer to develop numerous prototypes, you can actually examine the electrical properties of your PCBs before theyre even built. Thus, by the time you send the finished designs to the manufacturer, youre guaranteed prototypes which will meet or exceed expectations.
That said, make sure to edit your artwork thoroughly before submitting it to the manufacturer for fabrication. Most PCB makers wont allow you to change your designs after you submit them, as that could slow down the process line for other customers. In general, the more work you put into the design before you hand it off, the better your relationship with your manufacturer will be.
Printed circuit boards (PCBs) have been around for decades, but few people, even those intimately involved in PCB manufacturing, understand the principles of conductivity and resistivity which make these boards so dynamic and integral. Electrical circuits are based on the notion that free electrons can cycle through a conductor–for instance, a metal like copper.
Along the way, the electron stream can encounter numerous obstacles, which will impact the path of the charge. For instance, if the stream goes over whats known as a voltage drop–in which electrons jump from one energy level down to another–the system will release energy. On the other hand, electrons can run into whats known as a resistor, which impedes the flow of charge through the circuit.
Precise PCBs
There are numerous tricks of the trade that electronic engineers use to force streams of electrons to behave. That said, its truly remarkable that we have the technology to be able to fabricate such intricate circuitry on tiny scales. In many cases, PCBs are close to microscopic in size. In order to reach these levels of precision and sophistication, engineers must work closely with manufacturers to develop alloys and substrates for optimal flow.
There are an unlimited number of tools that electrical engineers can use to develop printed circuit boards. Notwithstanding the interesting technological innovations being bandied about by industry futurists, engineers can still paint with an infinite palette. After all, you can arrange the wires in components however you want on the board, provided that you have enough money to manufacture the prototype.